Barriers and incentives of physicians and patients to cancer screening.

It is imperative that the health care system provide mechanisms to improve cancer control. The most effective way of limiting cancer morbidity and mortality is by prevention (modification of behaviors that increase cancer risk), and by early diagnosis in the asymptomatic stage of the disease, which allows for curative therapies. This article has enumerated barriers that make preventive and early diagnostic maneuvers more difficult for both patients and physicians. Some of the barriers are common to both patients and physicians, such as discontinuity of care. The barriers were discussed from both perspectives. Suggestions were made for modification of these barriers, so that incentives might make provision of the preventive and early diagnosis more likely. The incentives are attainable; however, to make improvements on a large scale will require the efforts of the public, physicians, and the health care system. It will effect physicians from the beginning of their medical education and through their entire practice. A large amount of effort directed at a focused population by a small team of health care workers can make a large difference in preventive care. This was shown effectively by a general practitioner in England who undertook a 15-month "campaign" on a "deprived" community, and raised the level of preventive care to that of an "endowed" community. This type of effort by an individual is desirable, but much smaller individual efforts directed over an entire population can have a much greater ultimate effect. That is why the efforts must be directed toward the primary care physician. These physicians care for the majority of the population, so if each primary care doctor increased current efforts of prevention by just three patients per day, then over the entire population inestimable improvements on preventive care would result. There is some evidence that improvements in preventive care are occurring. As further research is directed at how best to provide preventive services in the physician's office, our skills and effectiveness will improve. Each physician should accept as his or her responsibility the ongoing preventive needs of the population he or she serves. The prevention and early diagnosis of cancer can be coordinated in the office with episodic care to minimize costs. The necessary knowledge and technology are available, application is the key. By applying these in a cost-effective way, we can hopefully attain control of cancer in the next decade.